Perhaps nobody in a Pittsburgh Steelers uniform who wasn’t a high rookie draft pick entered the 2021 season with more hype behind him than second-year cornerback James Pierre, a tall, small-school product who defied the odds by making the roster in 2020 during a pandemic, a college free agent with only training camp to prove himself.
It helped, perhaps, that we didn’t even get to see him much because there were no open practices nor preseason games. All we got were the glowing words of teammates, coaches, and reporters, and for most of the 2020 season, just some good work on special teams.